The Stockton Steelhead Festival is scheduled for 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday at the University of the Pacific's DeRosa University Center. A 5K run is also planned with registration starting at 7:30 a....

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The Stockton Steelhead Festival is scheduled for 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday at the University of the Pacific's DeRosa University Center. A 5K run is also planned with registration starting at 7:30 a.m. The festival is free.

It's one thing to celebrate the sandhill crane, since anyone can drive into the Delta and find them flying about.

Steelhead hiding in the murky Calaveras River, on the other hand, have a public relations problem.

That's why organizers of the second Stockton Steelhead Festival on Sunday plan to show off a handful of the threatened fish in a 200-gallon tank, so that the public can get a glimpse of one of the area's more valued yet rarely seen endangered species.

The festival moves this year from the Miracle Mile to the University of the Pacific, closer to the Calaveras River itself. It also shifts from May to October, the season in which steelhead are more likely to be heading upstream.

The changes are intended to build a stronger connection between the festival and the species it honors.

"Having live fish this year is a whole new thing," said Jeremy Terhune, head of the Friends of the Lower Calaveras River. "My dream is to build this into one of the premier fishery festivals in the north Valley, and I think Stockton is a great place for that."

Also new this year is a film festival in which Restore the Delta's new documentary, "Over Troubled Waters," will be shown, as well as a snippet from a documentary focusing on the cultural history of the Calaveras.

Inside the DeRosa University Center, fishermen will teach amateurs how to tie a fly. Outside, on the green lawn, they'll show how to cast it.

Groups will be led down to the Calaveras on a series of river walks, and fresh trout will be grilled up and served (the steelhead in the tank are off-limits).

About 2,000 people showed up for the first steelhead festival last year. Terhune said the goal is to lure at least that many again.

"It's really important that we show the stability and growth in the size of the festival," he said.

Steelhead are basically rainbow trout, with the difference being that they migrate from salt water to fresh water. At least two of the rare fish were caught on video as they swam up the Calaveras past Bellota Weir during a 10-day monitoring period last November.

The federal government has said the Calaveras could someday host a viable population of steelhead, but for now water diversions and a series of barriers in the river channel make for inconsistent populations.

The fish in the tank at Sunday's festival will come from a hatchery on the Mokelumne River. They are 2-year-old steelhead and won't quite be full-grown, said Donnie Ratcliff, a Lodi-based biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.